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Colbert Smears Tulsi Gabbard To Her Face While Telling Zero Jokes

Hawaii Congresswoman and Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard recently appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, where instead of the light, jokey banter about politics and who she is as a person that Democratic presidential candidates normally encounter on late night comedy programs, the show’s host solemnly ran down a list of textbook beltway smears against Gabbard and made her defend them in front of his audience.

Normally when a Democratic Party-aligned politician appears on such a show, you can expect jokes about how stupid Trump is and how badly they’re going to beat the Republicans, how they’re going to help ordinary Americans, and maybe some friendly back-and-forth about where they grew up or something. Colbert had no time to waste on such things, however, because this was not an interview with a normal Democratic Party-aligned politician: this was a politician who has been loudly and consistently criticizing US foreign policy.

After briefly asking his guest who she is and why she’s running for president, Colbert jumped right into it by immediately bringing up Syria and Assad, the primary line of attack employed against Gabbard by establishment propagandists in American mainstream media.

Colbert: Do you think the Iraq war was worth it?

Gabbard: No.

Colbert: Do you think that our involvement in Syria has been worth it?

Gabbard: No.

Colbert: Do you think that ISIS could have been defeated without our involvement and without our support of the local troops there?

Gabbard: There are two things we need to address in Syria. One is a regime change war that was first launched by the United States in 2011, covertly, led by the CIA. That is a regime change war that has continued over the years, that has increased the suffering of the Syrian people, and strengthened groups like Al Qaeda and ISIS, because the CIA was using American taxpayer dollars to provide arms and training and equipment to these terrorist groups to get them to overthrow the government. So that is a regime change war that we should not have been engaging.

Colbert: So, but if it is someone like Bashar al-Assad, who gasses his own people, or who engages in war crimes against his own people, should the United States not be involved?

Gabbard: The United States should not be intervening to overthrow these dictators and these regimes that we don’t like, like Assad, like Saddam Hussein, like Gaddafi, and like Kim Jong Un. There are bad people in the world, but history has shown us that every time the United States goes in and topples these dictators we don’t like, trying to end up like the world’s police, we end up increasing the suffering of the people in these countries. We end up increasing the loss of life, but American lives and the lives of people in these countries. We end up undermining our own security, what to speak of the trillions of dollars of taxpayer money that’s spent on these wars that we need to be using right here at home.

Like I said, this is not a normal presidential candidate. How often do you see a guest appear on a network late night talk show and talk about the CIA arming terrorists in Syria and the fact that US military interventionism is completely disastrous? It just doesn’t happen. You can understand, then, why empire propagandist Stephen Colbert spent the rest of the interview informing his TV audience that Tulsi Gabbard is dangerous and poisonous.

This was unwatchable. Colbert just went down the list of scripted Gabbard smears (Assad, David Duke) then sermonized about how US military intervention is a force for good in this world. All without telling a single joke. Late night "comedy" shows are propaganda for livestock. https://t.co/CqNF58sn9V

Colbert: You got some heat for meeting with Bashar al-Assad. Do you not consider him a war criminal? Why did you meet with that man?

Gabbard: In the pursuit of peace and security. If we are not willing to meet with adversaries, potential adversaries, in the pursuit of peace and security, the only alternative is more war. That’s why I took that meeting with Assad. In pursuit of peace and security.

Colbert: Do you believe he is a war criminal? Do you believe he gassed his own people or committed atrocities against his own people?

Gabbard: Yes. Reports have shown that that’s a fact.

Colbert: So you believe the intelligence agencies on that. Because I heard that you did not necessarily believe those reports.

The reason I call Colbert a propagandist and not simply a liberal empire loyalist who happens to have been elevated by billionaire media is because these are carefully constructed narratives that he is reciting, and they weren’t constructed by him.

Trying to make it look to the audience as though Gabbard is in some way loyal to Assad has been a high-priority agenda of the mainstream media ever since she announced her presidential candidacy. We saw it in her recent appearance on The View, where John McCain’s sociopathic daughter called her an “Assad apologist” and demanded that Gabbard call Assad an enemy of the United States. We saw it in her recent CNN town hall, where a consultant who worked on Obama’s 2008 campaign was presented as an ordinary audience member to help CNN’s Dana Bash paint Gabbard’s skepticism of intelligence reports about an alleged chemical weapons attack by the Syrian government as something that is weird and suspicious, instead of the only sane position in a post-Iraq invasion world. We saw it in her appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe last month, where the entire panel piled on her in outrage that she wouldn’t call Assad an enemy of the United States. It’s such a common propaganda talking point that the New York Times‘ Bari Weiss famously made a laughingstock of herself by repeating it as self-evident truth on The Joe Rogan Experience without having the faintest clue what specific facts it was meant to refer to, just because she’d heard establishment pundits saying it so much.

This is an organized smear by the mass media attempting to marry Gabbard in the eyes of the public to a Middle Eastern leader whom the propagandists have already sold as a child-murdering monster, and Colbert is participating in it here just as much as the serious news media talking heads are. It’s been frustrating to watch Gabbard fold to this smear campaign by acting like it’s an established fact that Assad “gases his own people” and not the hotly contested empire-serving narrative she knows it is. Gabbard is being targeted by this smear because she challenges US political orthodoxy on military violence (the glue which holds the empire together), so no amount of capitulation will keep them from trying to prevent the public from trusting her words.

The journalist interrogating Tulsi seems to believe that US forces in Syria are fighting Assad. Tulsi corrects her, says those troops were deployed there to fight ISIS. These people don’t even know what’s happening in the places they want the US to occupy pic.twitter.com/YWIbSVqePA

“I don’t know whether America should be the policemen of the world,” Colbert said after Gabbard defended her position.

“It is my opinion that we should not be,” Gabbard replied, causing Colbert to launch into a stuffy, embarrassing sermon on the virtues of interventionism and US hegemony that would make Bill Kristol blush.

“If we are not, though, nature abhors a vacuum, and if we are not involved in international conflicts, or trying to quell international conflicts, certainly the Russians and the Chinese will fill that vacuum. And we will step away from the world stage in a significant way that might destabilize the world, because the United States, however flawed, is a force for good in the world in my opinion. Would you agree with that?”

Again, this is a comedy show.

Gabbard explained that in order to be a force for good in the world the United States has to actually do good, which means not raining fire upon every nation it dislikes all the time. Colbert responded by reading off his blue index card to repeat yet another tired anti-Gabbard smear.

“You’ve gotten some fans in the Trump supporter world: David Duke, Steve Bannon, and, uh, Matt, uh, Gaetz, is that his name? Matt Gaetz? What do you make of how much they like you?”

This one is particularly vile, partly because Gabbard has repeatedly and unequivocally denounced David Duke, who has a long-established and well-known history of injecting himself into the drama of high-profile conversations in order to maintain the illusion of relevance, and partly because it’s a completely irrelevant point that is brought up solely for the purpose of marrying Tulsi Gabbard’s name to a former Ku Klux Klan leader. Colbert only brought this up (and made Newsweek totally squee) because he wanted to assist in that marrying. The fact that there are distasteful ideologies which also happen to oppose US interventionism for their own reasons does not change the undeniable fact that US military interventionism is consistently disastrous and never helpful and robs the US public of resources that are rightfully theirs.

This interview was easily Colbert’s most blatant establishment rim job I’ve ever seen, surpassing even the time he corrected his own audience when they cheered at James Comey’s firing to explain to them that Comey is a good guy now and they’re meant to like him. Colbert’s show is blatant propaganda for human livestock, and the fact that this is what American “comedy” shows look like now is nauseating.

When Tulsi Gabbard first announced her candidacy I predicted that she’d have the narrative control engineers scrambling all over themselves to kill her message, and it’s been even more spectacular than I imagined. I don’t agree with everything she says and does, but by damn this woman is shaking up the establishment narrative matrix more than anybody else right now. She’s certainly keeping it interesting.

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I agree. It was straight up and polite by both of them. Just comparing two differing opinions in a civil way. Apparently you have never seen a REAL heated discussion. This was certainly not one. And Tulsi will teach him how to surf.

Just to share something, Steven’s sister says their name is not “Kole – BARE” as in French. She said that is something he created so he could be an elitist……….and that the name is pronounced just plain, simple, blue collar “COLE – burt”.

I guess Little Steven got the memo. I also hope that Tulsi Gabbard remains in the race for President until the end, beating back most of the other contenders along the way.

But having to endure crap like this from the likes of Little Steven may have one positive effect: It may galvanize support for her campaign.

Remember how, four years ago (and to the present) that many of these ham-handed mental midgets in the populist press said that Donald Trump didn’t have a chance at becoming President because of his vulgar disposition and clear lack of understanding the United States’ role in the world? These will be the same types of slanders directed at Gabbard.

I’m not (yet) saying that she’s going to win. But her positions that she has to keep explaining to the morons within the Democrat Party leadership show that she’s the only one from that part of the two-headed swamp creature that will take on the leadership of the Democrat Party and their perception as being just a group of Socialist anti-Trumpers.

At least in a time when fake news, and propiganda, flood the information hwy, we can count on the over the top, extremely obvious responses, to rational ideas by the liberal savior’s of humanity, to brightly highlight the ppl to watch, all while digging themselves a hole so deep, one can only hope eventually their voices will no longer have to be suffered by those of us with use of 11% of our brains.

Daniel P Mullen/March 16, 2019

Paul Davies/March 15, 2019

Lighten up, Francis. This was a softball interview. She did just fine, the audience liked her, and Colbert’s questions were innocuous. If you think that was a “smear,” then you have no business supporting any candidate for president or calling yourself a journalist. Your nerves will never survive the experience. Good thing Tulsi Gabbard is a lot tougher than you are.

Erelis/March 18, 2019

Realist/March 15, 2019

Tomonthebeach/March 15, 2019

I have always wondered why any liberal would go on any FoxNews program (Carlson, Hannity, Judge da Jeanie, etc.) Guests on Cobert, Fallon, etc. never leave on life supports. Caitlin is overstating the evil that befell Gabbard – likely a gender-based overreaction. Other commenters here have concurred that she came off fine.

BTW, nearly all guests collude with the producers on talk shows. They are there for free to gain celebrity, hustle a new book or movie, gain name recognition, or to counter misinformation. I think the latter was Gabbard’s aim.

In contrast, I have watched smug libtards get mercilessly ganged up on and dissected on FoxNews.

Ian B Cooper/March 15, 2019

Colbert, like Jon Stewart before him, pretends to be a progressive, but he’s really a centrist neoliberal all the way. Maybe people don’t remember, but Stewart and Colbert were at the Occupy protests, making fun of the Occupy movement. When it’s a case of the 99% vs. the 1%, Stewart and Colbert will take the side of the 1% every time. These people are not on the side of the working class.

Erelis/March 15, 2019

Before the 2016 election both Colbert and Maddow were not doing very good in ratings. Fallon was totally wiping Colberts butt in the ratings. Maddow was a mediocrity at best in the ratings, as Bill O’Reilly constantly openly reminded her and MSNBC. But along comes in particular in 2016 and 2017 Russia hysteria and which CNN, Colbert, and Maddow then jump on big time. Ratings money train gold!!!!!!

This early timing was the birth of the Russiagate Consipracy Industry. First and foremost the defense industries of the US and NATO countries by my account have been infused with an addition $120+ billion dollars to counter the Russian threat. Not including are ratings, books sales, government and private and academic grants to find Russians, ratings of course, computer academics claiming absurd ways the Russians altered votes (consultation fees of course). And absolutely, the birth of social media censorship.

(I would point out the interesting case of TYT which adopted a rather extreme Russian xenophobia becaus they understood that is where their democratic party membership is at. Cenk rewarded their viewers even more with some rather profane homophobic rantings about Putin and Trump.)

The question for Colbert, Maddow, and others is how they will continue the proverbial gravy train when Mueller goes not deliver the political version of the Virgin Birth?

Tomonthebeach/March 14, 2019

Not sure I buy your attack on Colbert. For starters, it might be that Gabard requested this line of questioning. I did not feel that her take on war was confused by Colbert’s questions or remarks. If anything his questions enabled her to clarify – even rebut – opposition digs meant to distort her positions.

If we are honest with ourselves, the current menagerie of POTUS wannabes is about jockying for cabinet posts; not a serious run for the job. Despite the Clintonistas efforts, it is likely that Bernie will top the ticket. Biden is polling a bit higher mainly due to Obama fans’ pining for the good ole days. As more stories appear pointing out that Obama was far more sinner than saint, and that Joe is paid for by WS billionaires, Biden’s popularity will start to sag.

Erelis/March 15, 2019

Seriously Gabbard requested questions that used illegitmate logic such as libelous guilt by association, and taking responsbility for Duke’s opinions? I would love to read Tulsi’s accounts in future years where she encourage illigate and libelous questions.

Antonio/March 14, 2019

While I am not a Democrat, I respect Tulsi Gabbard for her stance on U.S. foreign policy.

However, it would be easier to make her case if she didn’t implicitly agree with the myth that Assad gassed his own people. Why did she not push back on that ‘fact’? She is contributing to the smear by not confronting the ‘facts’ head-on. She should take Caitlin’s advice. Rebut the smears, unequivocally.

If she cannot, or will not, do this, then her candidacy will be a vapor.

Hey! Ms. C.J. call em’ like you see em’. Let me yak on about Syria, since I know where it is on the map. Mr. ‘kill them all’ Assad, along with his good heart Bro. Putin, should be tried in world court for genocide. For the past 1-2 years the murdered figure has been stuck at around 500 thousand, even through the intensive bombing of Alleppo, and the other rebel held territories, So Putin(out of the goodness of his heart, not for a payoff and weapons testing) pulled Mr. Assad’ s butt out of the frying pan, so now he can go back to being the ruler of rubble…I am amazed that other countries are considering contributing funds to rebuilding Syria, considering that Assad and his daddy before him robbed their homeland blind for 50 years. If Assad does not have at least 50 billion stashed away, he is not the man I thought he was…..And my God, the hypocrisy—2,000 lb. bunker buster bombs, barrel bombs filled with nails and screws, Thermo-Baric bombs (High pressure/flame) and many other murdering weapons, all OK hunky-dory, but Gas, Oh! Shock, Shame, Bad, bad, bad…..One might consider all the maimed humans, men, women children, missing serious body parts, or hundreds of dead bodies crushed to death by pressure waves and then roasted into fireplace clinkers. Isn’t war a glorious thing? Great at population control, also great for the military/industrial complex.$$$$$$$$$$$$$WAR$$$$$$$$$$$. Wikipedia list of modern armament manufacturers 6/29/18; total over world= 793. USA =146. Keep people employed make tanks, warships, warplanes, missiles, ICBM’s Etc. I also have a printout of world wide conflicts ongoing and it too is a long one. Which is why I say Mankind is an Oxymoron.~~~~~What does this have to do with the subject at hand:Elections? I will dare to quote Mr. H. L. Mencken “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of Hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” The living end…..

Stephen Sadd/March 14, 2019

F. Foundling/March 14, 2019

The question whether Assad is an enemy of the United States is funny, because it obscures who the primary active side in the conflict is. It is not Assad that wants to be an enemy of the United States – especially at the moment – it is the United States that chooses to be an enemy of Assad. Assad doesn’t and cannot pose any threat to the US; the US does pose a great threat to Assad and is doing its best to destroy him. Yet the rhetorical implication of saying ‘Assad is the enemy of the US’ is that any American who proposes a less hostile policy towards Assad is favouring the enemy and acting treasonously against his home country. It’s a vicious circle: the United States must treat Assad as an enemy, because the United States is treating Assad as an enemy. Applied systematically, this rhetorical move implies that once the US has decided to destroy somebody, that decision is irrevocable and non-negotiable and must be implemented without any American ever questioning it. The assumption seems to be that if any government has ended up being in conflict with the United States, that could never under any circumstances be partly or wholly the fault of the United States, but can only be due to the foreign government’s innate evil and hatred of everything good, so the enmity is bound to continue indefinitely until said government is destroyed. ‘We are the good guys’, those that ‘we’ are acting against are ‘bad guys’, and everything else is derived from these profound axioms. . While Assad is, indeed, as far as I can tell, a dictator responsible for human rights violations – regardless of the specific issue of chemical attacks, which does seem rather murky – only somebody completely ignorant of international relations could believe that this is the reason why the United States treats him as an enemy. And, of course, Assad’s being a dictator does not change the fact that attacking him or arming rebels against him – especially Islamic fundamentalists using terrorism – is both illegal and bound to cause even greater harm.

Beware the phony left that pretends to be principled but then, strangely, breaks those principles. Sanders the ‘sheepdog’ pulled punches and supported Hillary after she conspired against his Movement. Gabbard now offers the reassuring trope that USA is the ‘good guys’ along with the lie that Syria was a (rouge) CIA effort.

The CIA reports to the President. It was Obama that ignored ISIS (dismissing its importance by calling it Al Queda’s “JV team”). It was the Obama Administration that made a ‘wilful decision’ to support ISIS because they weren’t able to bomb Syria as planned.

When Gabbard tells America the truth about the White Helmets then I’ll believe that she’s not a controlled opposition plant like Sanders.

jared/March 14, 2019

It would make sense if some lowlife politician paid Duke to say complimentary things about Gabbard. She should mention that as possibility. I am very glad to hear that she handled well, she gaining momentum I think. She is first politician I ever sent money and I do it monthly. The payment goes through a dnc affiliated service. Hmmm. Though I dont really care much for Bernie they could be a winning combo and that could get us three terms of Gabbard if shell have it.

jared/March 14, 2019

S Black/March 13, 2019

A quick and easy way to discern who’s who in the Deep State (which is the owner and controller of the MSM) – is to ask yourself, whom do they adore and whom do they despise? There are gradations and constant shiftings back and forth, but currently we know they absolutely hate, and would gladly obliterate, Julian Assange, Ilhan Omar, and Tulsi Gabbard. It should be obvious. Just pay attention: whom do the MSM triy to portray as smelling like pure shit? These targets are the true heroes, the self-sacrificial souls who are willing to put it all on the line for truth. If you doubt this, take a look at what they’ve done to Assange and to a number of heroic journalists and politicians who are now either dead by mysterious circumstance or sidelined into irrelevance.

Previously, Bernie was on their list, but his survival instinct kicked in and saved him from total annihilation. Chelsea Manning is hovering at the edge of the list, but it looks like her strength and resolve will place her there.

Tulsi’s courage and honesty in the face of this punishment is impressive. She, as well as Julian and Chelsea, deserves our wholehearted support, everything we can possibly give. I would add, honest journalists like Caitlin, as well.

do not donate to tulsi or any other establishment member/March 13, 2019

CFR member Tulsi sold out a long time ago. She could’ve said it’s at the very least open to debate whether Assad is a war criminal that gassed his own people and that it’s more probably false flags. She could’ve said he’s less of a war criminal than Cheney or Bolton or Abrams and that our government that leads our military occupies the moral low ground. But, she didn’t. Despite having ample time the past few years to prepare for these *recurring* allegations.

Nobody “makes the rounds” on government teevee without approval. So, what did the establishment want out of this? Maybe they just want this “minority voice” to affirm at least one part of the lies, so in viewers’ minds it’s never open for debate.

Ishkabibble/March 14, 2019

Robyn/March 14, 2019

I agree with DO NOT DONATE … Assad won elections, there is zero evidence that he ‘gassed his own people’, there is ample evidence of what USUK and Syria’s next door neighbour have been doing and promoting in Syria, ample evidence of who the White Helmets are, and ample evidence of MSM blatant lies and war-mongering. Nobody could spend five minutes on honest alternative media sites and still believe the MSM garbage. I suspect Tulsi is another Deep State candidate from the same mould as Obama – young, looks good, articulate, charming, and says what people want to hear. Wins office and carries on with the Deep State agenda. Another wolf in sheep’s clothing.

inforebelscum/March 14, 2019

Bob/March 13, 2019

He wasn’t fawning and asked some bad questions and i sort of agree with you- but you oversold this one big time Caitlin. I even sent your piece around because i’m a big Tulsi supporter and when I finally watched it- because i was told by those i sent it to that it wasnt so bad and it made her look good—you made me look bad. I didn’t do my due diligence so it’s my fault

he’s an asshiole but he did make a joke about surfing, which makes her look cool. so you were totally wrong on that score.

jo/March 13, 2019

With all respect to Tulsi Gabbard in all belongings as a human being, woman and politician lets not forget here that USA has become a proven war criminal and is loving it. So where will this classless farce of presenting a good and truthfully (to some extent) person in a tyranny of perverted oligarchs lead us if not into the same direction that has been followed the last 200 years of “American bloody history”? So lets keep pursuing the divide and conquer thingi for the masses until the last coin, gold and blood is fleeced from the dull and unworthy ones that have been the champs of patriotism from hell. The future looks grim and even though Tulsi seems like a fresh breeze in the hippocratical landscape of American politics – trying to turn a spoiled and rotten brew into a sweet smelling and tasty dish that will cater nourishment for all is rather unlikely.

mike k/March 13, 2019

elkojohn/March 13, 2019

Years ago when I worked in the coal mines, whenever our union had a top notch worker on the union committee to fight for our rights, eventually, the company would offer him (sorry, no women in the mines back then) a foreman’s job, which paid more money, to get him out of the union. Then if the new foreman wouldn’t tow the company line, they would fire him without cause. – Stephen C, Rachel M, et al. took the bait. Phil Donahue & Ed Schultz did not.

RC-Garrs/March 13, 2019

I’m doubling down on what Polly said, before. I used to like Colbert when he appeared on the Comedy Network, Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

When Jon decided to give up his show to Noah, I was pretty sure it was time to cut the cable and go to “over air” for TV viewing. And I did.

And with that and Steven Colbert taking over Letterman’s late night show, I thought it a good move. That is until I could PLAINLY SEE Colbert knuckle under to the power, instead of speaking truth to power. That all seemed to take place when he tried to carry forward his old shtick. He so much as admitted he wasn’t free to do that style show on CBS and promptly received his marching orders from Moonves ( I’m assuming ).

I sensed something was amiss here. I watched a few more weeks, most of the nights, and saw what a whore he had become for the $$$.

I think Jon Stewart knows it, too. I think he’d bring that to the forefront but, being good buddies with Stephen, he must feel his own decision to retire brought about the whole consequence.

Yeah, maybe I’m reading too much into it, but in light of Cait!s report on last nights episode ( again, I’ve boycotted his show after the first few weeks, so I didn’t watch it ) I don’t think I’m much off the mark.

Good thing I didn’t watch it. That way I didn’t have to clean up all the puke.

Lately I’ve noticed, there are war hawks on both sides of the aisle. Their only loyalty is toward our giant US war machine and in the direction of everlasting wars, as we bully nations unable to defend themselves, instead of working toward world peace.

Andre Wilson/March 13, 2019

OK, Colbert i s a RepubliCrat shill, no question. Howevah, he is not a moron. One very clear fact was that Colbert’s audience was on Gabbard’s side. He got zero audience response to his jabs and, of highest significance, he f a i l e d in his effort to provoke Gabbard or to gather support for the “Charlottesville Centrists” among the Demo wing of the DemoPublican machine. The Blue Dog, Third Way, &c. Center-Right Democrats are a v i t a l part of Mfg. Consent, Inc.’s gameplan to pull Dem. voters Right in 2020. A still-serving active duty veteran candidate openly opposing Imperialist interventionism and saying, “let’s start delivering some of the ( items Trump formerly promised ) infrastructure, education, health care, child care, elder care, &c……” our folks need, is their worst nightmare. Final Score: Tulsi 1 (sounds like “won”) Colbert ∅

Rick Patel/March 13, 2019

Antipropo/March 13, 2019

I agree with Caitlin that this was a planned ambush and smear job but I also feel Gabbard generally handled herself well. In a weird way Colbert gave her the opening to offer a counter narrative to the “consensus” view of America’s consistently disastrous and deadly wars. As a New Zealander I don’t care that it costs trillions of dollars needed for the American people, that’s what you get for voting for worse and worser (I know that’s not a word but hey). I also don’t understand why she conceded the lie about Assad “gassing his own people” the OPCW final report into the Douma incident emphatically refutes this, the earlier Khan Sheikoun incident has so many holes if it was a boat it would sink.

Polly/March 13, 2019

I was a HUGE fan of Colbert when he was on Comedy Central. When he left, I was in deep mourning. Then something changed – both with him and myself. In the interim before his new show, I became woke and left the Democratic party of which I’d been a loyal member for decades. By the time his new show started, I saw him through new eyes. I saw the sell out schtick. I can no longer watch him no matter who his guest might be. He is a tool of TPTB and a righteous one at that. Shame on him!

Rod Coombes/March 13, 2019

The transparency of the Dark State and its’ warmongering cabal of ZioNeoCons is becoming ever more transparent through their media propaganda campaigns that openly vilify any person who speaks the truth.Gabbard is about as close as you can get next to Ilhan Omar and Ortez.We have two camps: One for the military warmongering NeoCons on behalf of Israel and One for the people.It’s 1 or 2 and very clear.

Dennis ONeill/March 13, 2019

Colbert is a puppet paid to parrot propaganda given him by pimps who pay him to bend over while taking it up his rear end from those pimps who penetrate all the way to his brain to damage it, all while the pimps don’t use lube, or a jimmy because spreading pain, and mind disease is their goal. The psychopaths, and sociopaths who rule this world love harming people, and part of their enjoyment is paying what is to them a pittance to their chattel victims who they mind, and otherwise rape who then perform mass mind infections of our culture. In Colbert’s case his mind is small, so it’s easy to pull his strings. I don’t watch television or pay any attention to any advertising anywhere whether in print, bill boards, or on line because it all causes brain damage, and is propaganda, so I’m not all that familiar with Colbert, other than to know he seems incredibly smug, and lacking in any sense of humor. I am reading the most deeply disturbing book I have ever read entitled “The Most Dangerous Book in the World: 9/11 as Mass Ritual” by S.K. Bain, who used to work with scum bags like Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard, and the other psycopathic neocons involved in that now-defunct publication of propaganda, which I devoutly used to read because I always want to know what the real enemies of the U.S. and the enemies of freedom, and of democracy are thinking, Bain’s worked with Peter Levenda which concerns me because Levenda apparently has worked with CIA asset Tom Delonge of Blink 182, but Bain’s 9/11 book is solid, and bone chilling in its well substantiated revelations. The Colberts of the world are but props of the sociopaths. If Tulsi Gabbard keeps up her outspokenness, and if she’s for real, and not controlled opposition, she’ll find herself assassinated if she gets electoral traction. The hard core criminals who run the CIA, and the rest of the front organizations for the international deep state cabal will stop at nothing to subjugate humanity. They’ll kill their own family members if need be, and enjoy doing so.

Rod Coombes/March 13, 2019

Jack Kirchhoff/March 13, 2019

Wow. You really need to calm down, Caitlin. I watched that Colbert show, and Colbert was friendly and courteous. He asked questions that needed to be asked and Gabbard was just fine with it. Her answers were clear and direct, and she came out of it looking good. I know that I had a much better idea of where she was coming from; I felt, for the first time, that I could support her. Hell, I’d bet she was delighted with the results. And by the way, the Colbert show is not, strictly speaking, a “comedy” show. The talk-show format goes back to Johnny Carson: opening monologue, a couple of guests, some music. You do Gabbard no favour by loading all this baggage onto what was, by any measure, a pleasant and productive appearance.

Dennis ONeill/March 13, 2019

Gabbard did handle having Colbert in the guise of Joseph Goebbels spew deep state propaganda at her like diarrhea quite well. That’s you don’t vomit when someone spews out their rear end strikes me as strange. Do you lack a b.s. detector or just a sense of smell?

Sean Harvey/March 13, 2019

I don’t think it was all that bad. Those smears are out there, and who better to rebut them than the unflappable Gabbard? And I just learned that the US, apparently, has to dominate the world because if we don’t, someone else will. (Yes, someone else will have to use their blood and treasure and cripple their economy by diverting their GDP into weapons of war – which are the shittiest investment there is.)

“If we don’t do it, someone else will”, hmmm. Now who else used that as an excuse for committing atrocities, Let me think…

It is controlled — across the board (minus maybe 2%). It is scripted — across the globe. It is staged — across every avenue. Those Facts are now in the open — for everyone to see/hear. Consider the following point in history, what was taking place before, then, and what has culminated, step by step (as produced) thereafter: Silencing Donahue and Anti-War Voiceshttps://consortiumnews.com/2012/01/15/silencing-donahue-and-anti-war-voices/

Greg Ross/March 13, 2019

Anybody remember the Rally to Restore Sanity and the few worthless months of scripted governtainment that led up to it? I bet that’s worth a retrospective comedy bit. These guys are worse than the worst scumlords of CNN and Fox for the simple fact they target the exact people that are still open-minded and wanting real change then these clowns belittle hard truths and champion cynicism and mediocrity. What a con jobs.

Side note – Rolling Stone’s current cover features Nancy Pelosi as the face of the movement in 2019. I thought it was a sad but ultimately quite telling.

Dennis DuBois/March 13, 2019

Colbert has come a long way from his Press club presentation roasting Pres. Bush, the younger. I guess it happens, money spoils, and lots of money turns the spoiled rotten. Once they have it, they know where it is coming from, and they know how to move their mouths to say the words, that will demonstrate they are in on the narrative. All that said, Fuck Colbert, I think she held up well, and I agree with the great majority of her positions. Democrats who will join the debate will need to study up their foreign policy. That means most of them.

Aardvark-Gnosis/March 13, 2019

It is entirely possible that the boob tube is responsible for the conditioned masses mind set to believe anything in the realm of possibility. I say look to other sources first… turn off the tube and become someone other than a moron with an opinion. Lest we fall into the pit of commercial ignorance by default, then there is no hope for any of us. I would like to find a good self help book I could recommend to any suffering from propaganda trauma and state educated conditioning… but, I’m afraid the latter would be the oxymoron in the altered moronic space of complacency, via the latter conditioned state of most humans here in the land of OZ, and frankly observing my own dilemma of “Higher learning” I include myself in my repenting state of mind. Stephen Colbert,??? Is he a Jewish Catholic… Now that’s an anti-Semitic joke folks… No one is laughing? Why would anyone support genocide in the middle east? Two wrongs make a right and the A-moral code of materialism is the order of any millionaire… Tulsi Gabbard is in the den of vampires and on corporate owned Zionist media. How simple is that for an explanation? Is Colbert a free thinker? Or a scripted near-do-well fostered by edited media and writers of the purple haze. If not, He must like his money job and sees telling the truth a miscarriage of the bottom line $$$$#$… is Assad gassing his own people? Propaganda, conditioning of the masses, all the latter is true… But the real news of Israeli using tactical nukes on Syria is left out of the commentary because it’s not the subject of reference just a side track from the real issues of genocide and tactical nukes no one is aware of… This is probably going to be censored, but let’s see what happens?

jo/March 13, 2019

Lets remember one important fact: If VT would cause to be a serious threat to American Reality, the military establishment and the arms deal and profit that run American politics it would never exist as “moderate opposition” in the first place. As ALL opposing parties these days have taken up residence on the same side of the coin of Surreality all should be taken with a kosher grain of salt especially when Duff writes about “national and international security issues” posing an insider.

Ishkabibble/March 13, 2019

Adam Nation/March 13, 2019

“You’ve gotten some fans in the Trump supporter world: David Duke, Steve Bannon, and, uh, Matt, uh, Gaetz, is that his name? Matt Gaetz? What do you make of how much they like you?” —Stephen Colbert

I hear Charles Manson, Dick Cheney, and child-raping priest Paul Shanley LOVE the Colbert show. Secondly, the second Stephen Colbert or Meghan McCain or Dana Bash picks up a gun, goes to Syria and gets shot to pieces is the second I will have an ounce of respect for them and their views. Until then: STFU.

Cora Brigg/March 13, 2019

“Propaganda for human livestock” – what a great phrase! I am so stealing this!

As for Colbert, I had him pegged as a shill for empire way back when. All of these “rebel comedians” (Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, etc.) are controversial just long enough to get into the mainstream media’s good graces, and then they turn into obedient corporate lap dogs right on cue, along with their long-term multi-Million dollar contracts. I can’t watch anything on network tv or cable tv anymore. It’s too painful. So I appreciate folks like you who do the dirty work and watch this drivel and report back to us!

One Akamai Tita/March 13, 2019

I stopped watching all network television years ago. I read mainstream media only to monitor what lies are being sold to the public so I can find suitable alternative press to spread far and countering the official lies. Everyone else should get busy helping spread the truth as well.

Pure brainwashing propaganda or mindless infotainment drivel is ALL you will find on the corporate boob tube. Colbert is the norm, not the exception.

Colbert once (long ago) seemed like a down to earth guy, but it is reprehensible what a hollow coward he has turned out to be. Gabbard should have flat out said that the gassings were fake on national television and watched this puny twerp’s head explode. I agree that she shouldn’t be holding back. Exude the honesty completely, throw it right in their fucking faces, suffocate them with it. They have no where to hide from truth.

LSJohn/March 13, 2019

“in their faces”

Right, because there is no amount of taking the edge off the truth that could do her any good. She’s an enemy of the Establishment Empire and she will be treated as such. The only way she could be elected is by the mirror image of the Trump revolt… enough people so fed up with the swamp critters…

metni/March 14, 2019

I feel exactly the same. She allowed the gassing ruse to get by more than once. If authenticity is only poured in minute accretions, it will ferment and become spoiled in the vessel which contains it. She may feel that disputing that lie will make people think she is a fringe extremist, but she can cite the OPCW findings to defend that as well as the tactical lunacy of using chemical agents knowing that doing so would provide additional pretext for US intervention while at the same time providing no military advantage as a weapon. Both alleged chemical events took place at a time when the Syrian Army was crushing the jihadist mercenary fanatics that were unleashed to wreak havoc in the pursuit of toppling the government and creating yet another failed state.

Spanky/March 13, 2019

“I don’t agree with everything she [Tulsi Gabbard] says and does, but by damn this woman is shaking up the establishment narrative matrix more than anybody else right now. She’s certainly keeping it interesting.” – Caitlin Johnstone . On this point, we agree. And, altho I do have reservations about her, I also like what she is saying…

Colbert is another shameless tool, not in the least funny. Can’t believe the so-called educated, hipster population hangs on his every word. Nauseating. But why did Gabbard concede that Assad gassed his own people?

Progressives, we really need to get real about who and what the Democratic Party is, and it’s not us. Tulsi is, but as with others who decided change from within was the best tactic, Tulsi is wrong about her political home and ought to join with other like minded civic leaders in a party of our own, one not just as sullied as the GOP. One free of the Deep State, the fraudulent faux journalism corporate media and the neoliberal neoconservative convergence designed to maintain an active state of perpetual war. It’s way past time for us to get real.

“This is a matter of an entire police force, from sea to shining sea, which insists on the gratuitous use of violence and will defend anyone who uses it.” https://twitter.com/caitoz/status/1269450962952810496